George Bush’s Venezuelan coup didn’t workout as planned, but that’s the way it goes, win some, lose some. Mr. Bush went two-for-three in ousting leaders he opposed in April and the two wins were so smooth, most Americans never knew they took place.
On April 19th, Robert Watson was replaced as chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC is the group that represents 2,000 climate scientists around the globe and under Dr. Watson’s leadership, provided clear evidence that wholesale combustion of fossil fuels is warming the planet.
The IPCC was formed in 1988 by the United Nations to investigate climate change. It issued reports in 1990, 1995 and 2001. These reports summarize and assess the state of climate change science and represent our best understanding of the issue. Information in the 1995 report laid the groundwork for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on global warming.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change represents the overwhelming consensus of meteorological scientists. With Dr. Watson in charge, the work of the IPCC was methodical and scientifically stringent. Of course, everything the IPCC does has been opposed by the oil and coal industries, and therefore by the Bush administration. Those groups refuse to acknowledge climate change even exists.
With that in mind, the White House and the oil industry launched a lobbying campaign last year to deny another term to Dr. Watson. When the secret ballots were counted, Robert Watson was out and the Bush administration’s preferred candidate, Rajendra Pachuri of India, was in.
The ouster of Robert Watson for telling truths the White House didn’t want to hear was the Bush team’s not-so-subtle Earth Day message, even though it was cloaked in the usual spin. Among the excuses offered for opposing Dr. Watson was the notion that important international groups should have leaders from the developing world.
A laudable goal, but if it’s true, why did the Bush people also engineer the coup against Brazilian Jose Bustani, director general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons?
Three days after Dr. Watson was taken out at IPCC, Mr. Bustani lost a special vote at OPCW. Insiders say Mr. Bustani was tossed out because he was nearing an agreement with Iraq for that country to allow inspection of its capacities to manufacture chemical weapons.
It was, after all, Mr. Bustani’s job to see that the 145 nations that signed the Chemical Weapons Convention live up to their obligations and to persuade non-member nations, like Iraq, to join the convention and allow inspections. Isn’t that a good thing, to get Iraq to join the community of nations and allow international inspectors to verify that Saddam Hussein is not manufacturing chemical weapons? Isn’t that what we want?
Apparently not. On the record, the U.S. says Jose Bustani is a bad leader, guilty of mismanagement. That’s an odd position, because less than a year ago, the U.S. supported the election of Mr. Bustani to his second four-year term of office. Now, less than a year into that term, the U.S. says Mr. Bustani has mismanaged so badly he must be removed.
Besides, the U.S. says, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons is not the proper agency to deal with Saddam on chemical weapons. That job, the White House says, should fall to the United Nations. Of course, the last U.N. weapons inspection team to go to Iraq was riddled with U.S. spies, but we’re supposed to ignore that.
Even if a U.N. inspection team got into Iraq, and even if it gave Iraq a passing grade on prohibited weapons, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the Washington Post that may not be good enough. It seems that for the Pentagon, the only thing that will be good enough is an all-out war on Iraq.
Von Clausewitz said war is politics by other means. For the Bush administration, international politics is war by other means.
By Other Means
George Bush’s Venezuelan coup didn’t workout as planned, but that’s the way it goes, win some, lose some. Mr. Bush went two-for-three in ousting leaders he opposed in April and the two wins were so smooth, most Americans never knew they took place.
On April 19th, Robert Watson was replaced as chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC is the group that represents 2,000 climate scientists around the globe and under Dr. Watson’s leadership, provided clear evidence that wholesale combustion of fossil fuels is warming the planet.
The IPCC was formed in 1988 by the United Nations to investigate climate change. It issued reports in 1990, 1995 and 2001. These reports summarize and assess the state of climate change science and represent our best understanding of the issue. Information in the 1995 report laid the groundwork for the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on global warming.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change represents the overwhelming consensus of meteorological scientists. With Dr. Watson in charge, the work of the IPCC was methodical and scientifically stringent. Of course, everything the IPCC does has been opposed by the oil and coal industries, and therefore by the Bush administration. Those groups refuse to acknowledge climate change even exists.
With that in mind, the White House and the oil industry launched a lobbying campaign last year to deny another term to Dr. Watson. When the secret ballots were counted, Robert Watson was out and the Bush administration’s preferred candidate, Rajendra Pachuri of India, was in.
The ouster of Robert Watson for telling truths the White House didn’t want to hear was the Bush team’s not-so-subtle Earth Day message, even though it was cloaked in the usual spin. Among the excuses offered for opposing Dr. Watson was the notion that important international groups should have leaders from the developing world.
A laudable goal, but if it’s true, why did the Bush people also engineer the coup against Brazilian Jose Bustani, director general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons?
Three days after Dr. Watson was taken out at IPCC, Mr. Bustani lost a special vote at OPCW. Insiders say Mr. Bustani was tossed out because he was nearing an agreement with Iraq for that country to allow inspection of its capacities to manufacture chemical weapons.
It was, after all, Mr. Bustani’s job to see that the 145 nations that signed the Chemical Weapons Convention live up to their obligations and to persuade non-member nations, like Iraq, to join the convention and allow inspections. Isn’t that a good thing, to get Iraq to join the community of nations and allow international inspectors to verify that Saddam Hussein is not manufacturing chemical weapons? Isn’t that what we want?
Apparently not. On the record, the U.S. says Jose Bustani is a bad leader, guilty of mismanagement. That’s an odd position, because less than a year ago, the U.S. supported the election of Mr. Bustani to his second four-year term of office. Now, less than a year into that term, the U.S. says Mr. Bustani has mismanaged so badly he must be removed.
Besides, the U.S. says, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons is not the proper agency to deal with Saddam on chemical weapons. That job, the White House says, should fall to the United Nations. Of course, the last U.N. weapons inspection team to go to Iraq was riddled with U.S. spies, but we’re supposed to ignore that.
Even if a U.N. inspection team got into Iraq, and even if it gave Iraq a passing grade on prohibited weapons, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the Washington Post that may not be good enough. It seems that for the Pentagon, the only thing that will be good enough is an all-out war on Iraq.
Von Clausewitz said war is politics by other means. For the Bush administration, international politics is war by other means.